


We're Learning to Love (But it's Hard When You're Young)

by flamefox428



Series: Bemily Week 2018 [2]
Category: Pitch Perfect (Movies)
Genre: Bemily Week, Day 2, F/F, Height difference, loosely in theme, protective!Beca
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-12
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2019-03-30 14:22:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13953450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamefox428/pseuds/flamefox428
Summary: Emily just brings out something protective in Beca.Or, a character study on a tiny rage monster.





	We're Learning to Love (But it's Hard When You're Young)

**Author's Note:**

> The is loosely in theme with height difference. It's more of an exploration of the contrast between a tiny Beca and all the emotions she has that make her the protective one. 
> 
> Also highkey definitely not my best work, but I really wanted to get something posted for today. I'm really looking forward to soulmate day though!!!

When Beca was six years old, she got sent to the principal’s office for punching a boy on the playground.

He had been harassing the new boy in Beca’s class, and Beca didn’t like that one bit. She had marched her tiny self over there to tell the boy to go bother somebody else, and he had called her a shrimp and told her to go play with the kindergarteners. Beca was very affronted by this. She was going into the second grade, she was _not_ a kindergartener.

She had told the boy this, but he had just called her a shrimp again, so Beca punched him square in the stomach. Unfortunately, a teacher had noticed the altercation, and had hauled her tiny ass to the principal’s office.

They had called her parents and her dad came to get her and took her home, but they had ice cream in the car on the drive back, and he showed Beca the proper way to punch someone so she wouldn’t hurt her hand, so Beca knew she wasn’t in trouble.

Her dad told her it was a good thing to protect the people you cared about. He looked Beca in the eye and ruffled her hair, telling her he would always protect her, like her own knight in her fairytale books.

Beca liked how that sounded, and decided that she would be a knight too. She didn’t want to be the damsel in distress, she would be the protector, rescuing people from the dragons.

/ / /

In middle school, Beca was sent to the principal’s office for knocking out a boy who was harassing her friend during lunch period. When she had told him to fuck off, he had told her that girls couldn’t fight, especially a girl her size, so she had decked him, the way her father had shown her to.

At her age, adults liked to say she was a ‘problem child,’ and loved to talk over her like she was some little kid still. So what if she looked like she was 8 years old? Nobody was going to push her around.

Her father had been more upset with her this time, saying it wasn’t right to hit other people at her age. When she told him a boy wouldn’t leave Sophie alone, her dad had told her it was good to stand up for others, even though there were other ways to do it. They had gone home that day with ice cream cones.

Beca decided that it was good to protect people. It made her feel bigger than she was. It felt good to be the knight.  

/ / /

When Beca’s parents divorced, she grew sick of the idea of heroes and fairytales. None of that was real, because love didn’t fix everything. Love didn’t even last.

Beca drew into herself and became more reserved. As she transitioned into high school, she became more aggressive, and lost touch with more of her friends. Her principal’s office visits became more frequent, but her dad was never there to pick her up and grab an ice cream cone with her.

Beca had given up on being the knight.

Now, she had never felt more like the dragon.

/ / /

At 19 years old, Beca had turned into a rebellious, angsty teen. She wore dark eyeliner and had spiky piercings in her ears, and she didn’t give a fuck about what anyone had to say about her. Her dad had gotten her a near free ride through Barden University because of his standing as a professor, and Beca had never hated him more. She wouldn’t owe anything to him.

She wouldn’t have him trying to be her knight again. That fairytale was dead.

She met a boy named Jesse and he asked her if she had gotten lost on the way to high school. She punched him in the stomach, but he smiled so brightly that she decided he wasn’t too bad, even if he teased her about her height.

She met a girl named Chloe, who seemed determined as all hell to adopt Beca into her friend group. Beca had dug in her heels and stayed persistent and distanced and angry until the last moment, when she realized she began to need these girls as much as they needed her.

She went to her dad for advice, and she pretended everything between them was okay again. Just this once.

/ / /

When Beca was 22, she met Emily Junk.

She was awkward and excitable and she was so clumsy. But she was _so_ excited to meet Beca, which was something Beca didn’t understand.

Beca remembers her first thought when meeting Emily Junk. _Wow, this girl is so tall_ , immediately followed by _wow, this girl is so pretty_. Beca, who had never been good about dealing with her emotions, had muttered out some dumb thing about legacies, cringing internally about how awkward she had sounded. Emily had laughed though, so Beca counted it as a win.

It was not hard to discern what kind of person Emily was after that. She was innocent and sunshiny, and she looked at the world like it was full of opportunities. She was the exact opposite of Beca basically.

For whatever reason, Amy had decided that she had a bone to pick with Emily. Beca was shocked to hear Amy being so shady to Emily in their first practice, when the girl was just trying to be optimistic. Beca had said nothing in the moment, but had snapped at Amy and made her do extra cardio at the following practice.

She didn’t know what it was, but something about Emily just sparked that old protectiveness in Beca.

The dragon curled around her heart loosened its grip ever so slightly.

/ / /

As the year went by, Beca became more and more protective of Emily Junk. Chloe jokingly liked to call her the Emily Junk Defense Squad, and had gone so far as to make her a t-shirt for Christmas. Beca tolerated the teasing, because she really couldn’t help it. Something about the idea of someone being mean to Emily just didn’t sit right in her stomach.

When Beca had come home one day to Emily in tears, she had gone into hyper protective mode. She comforted the crying girl before eventually getting her to admit what was wrong. It turns out a boy in her psychology class had asked her out, and when Emily said no he had said some pretty nasty things about her in the very public quad after class.

Beca was steaming, and the dragon reared its head, demanding vengeance.

The next day, Beca tracked down the guy and chewed him out in the quad in front of all his friends, and he had the nerve to call her a shrimp. Boys never learned, did they? Beca dared him to call her short again, and of course he did, so she decked him.

He called her a bitch, but she didn’t care what he was saying about her. Beca had built up a very tough skin over the years.

But then this entitled asshole had started saying shit about Emily again and the she felt the need to protect again like a primal calling. Unfortunately, a dean had gathered to see what the commotion was, and Beca had slipped through the crowd undetected.

She was still furious at the guy for having said that stuff about Emily though, and now she couldn’t hit him again since the dean was there.

Beca wouldn’t admit to being the one who put the raccoon in his car the next day, and nobody would ever trace it back to her anyway.

/ / /

When Beca and Emily inevitably started dating, Emily brought out the protective side of Beca even more than she ever had. Emily loved it though, and would constantly tell Beca how cute it was that she was so small and yet so protective and ready to fight anyone and everyone.

“You’re like a scrappy little terrier,” Emily told her one day, sitting at the kitchen table.

“I’m not that little,” Beca had grumbled, but she was halfway onto the counter trying to reach her coffee mug on the top shelf of the cupboard. Emily giggled and brushed up behind Beca, easily grabbing the mug and placing it in her hands.

“My tiny knight in shining headphones,” Emily had giggled instead, placing her chin on Beca’s head and her arms around Beca’s waist. Beca rolled her eyes, but still turned and popped up on her tiptoes to kiss Emily.

“I’m not big on fairytales,” Beca mumbled against Emily’s lips. And it was true.

Beca had always wanted to be the knight, rescuing the princess and protecting the villagers.

Until she realized that real life was so much better.


End file.
